LNER Route: Leicester to Marylebone

Staverton Road Signal Cabin

Staverton Road Signal Cabin stands on the embankment of the
Great Central Railway's line between Braunston & Willoughby and Charlwelton
stations, adjacent to A425. It lies on the Northamptonshire side of the
Northamptonshire - Warwickshire border and in reality wouldn't have been
included on this website other than by the happy accident that these
photographs were sent to me by Gordon Coltas as being within Warwickshire. As
they are of a important period of change not recorded elsewhere on the former
GCR line within the county, I have decided to include them on the basis that
within a short distance from Staverton these locomotives would have been
working just as hard but within the county. Staverton Road was not a strategic
or special location, but for one photographer it was a good place to take
photographs. Many of the photographs on this page are credited to Gordon
Coltas, as are many others at Braunston & Willoughby station and indeed
across the whole website. Whilst I have credited these photographs to Gordon,
from whom I purchased them in the late 1970s, they are in fact undoubtedly the
work of HJ Stretton-Ward, a local photographer, whose interest in railways
started before the First World War.

Stretton-Ward's collection was sold on his death by his
'girlfriend' with whom he lived with, together with his wife, in Leamington.
Many photographs were sold directly to collectors by Stretton-Ward but it was
Stretton-Ward's girlfriend who sold both photographs and negatives onto other
collectors, with Gordon Coltas apparently buying the lion's share. Roger
Carpenter, who also bought some of HJ Stretton-Ward's collection to add to his
own considerable library of photographs, was the person who first confirmed to
me that both photographs and negatives were sold to different people. Patrick
Kingston, a notable author and photographer from Leamington also told the same
story, plus recounting too that Stretton-Ward, wearing his characteristic
'plus fours', wasn't the nicest of people. All of this is why the same
photograph may be attributed to two or more people in various publications
(particularly the Great Western Railway Journal which nearly always credits
such photographs to Stretton-Ward). The photographs taken at Braunston &
Willoughby during 1928 would seem to prove the point as Gordon was too young to
have taken the photographs. Irrespective of who actually was the real
photographer we must at the very least recognise and appreciate Gordon's role
in ensuring that this valuable collection has been preserved. We must therefore
thank the Gordon Coltas Photographic Trust for ensuring its survival after his
demise in the same way that the Lens of Sutton Association supports John
Smith's collection.